Rachau is a former municipality in the district of Murtal in

Styria Styria (german: Steiermark ; Serbo-Croatian and sl, ; hu, Stájerország) is a state (''Bundesland'') in the southeast of Austria. With an area of , Styria is the second largest state of Austria, after Lower Austria. Styria is bordered to ...

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

with 626 inhabitants. Since the 2015

Styria municipal structural reform The Styria municipal structural reform (German: ''Steiermärkische Gemeindestrukturreform'') was a local government reform in the Austrian state of Styria, which was made effective January 1, 2015. This reform nearly halved the number of Styrian ...

, it is part of the municipality Sankt Margarethen bei Knittelfeld. It is divided into three districts: Mitterbach, Glein Rachau and the village of Rachau itself. Neighbouring settlements include Apfelberg, St. Margarethen, St. Lorenzen, Kleinlobming, St. Stefan ob Leoben, Salla, Übelbach, Kainach bei Voitsberg und Gallmannsegg. The Mayor of Rachau was Karl Hirtler of the

ÖVP The Austrian People's Party (german: Österreichische Volkspartei , ÖVP ) is a Christian-democratic and liberal-conservative political party in Austria. Since December 2021, the party has been led provisionally by Karl Nehammer. It is curr ...

; Bernadette Hartleb (ÖVP) was vice mayor. There is a primary school and two volunteer firefighters in the village.

Rachau hillclimb

From 1995 to 2004 Rachau hosted a

hillclimbing Hillclimbing, also known as hill climbing, speed hillclimbing, or speed hill climbing, is a branch of motorsport in which drivers compete against the clock to complete an uphill course. It is one of the oldest forms of motorsport, since the firs ...

event. Riders of motorbikes and also quadbikes and even the occasional car or converted jetski/snowmobile would attempt to ride as far up the hillside as possible without falling off. Whoever attained the greatest distance won the event. This was televised across Europe on

Eurosport Eurosport is a group of pay television networks in Europe and parts of Asia. Owned by Warner Bros. Discovery through its international sports unit, it operates two main channels— Eurosport 1 and Eurosport 2—across most of its territorie ...

and attracted a trackside audience of 10,000 to 30,000 people. It also had sponsorship from the drink

Red Bull Red Bull is a brand of energy drinks of Austrian company Red Bull GmbH. With 38% market share, it is the most popular energy drink brand as of 2019. Since its launch in 1987, more than 100 billion cans of Red Bull have been sold worldwide, inc ...

References

External links

Pictures of the 2003 and 2004 Rachau Hillclimb
Motorsport venues in Austria Hillclimbing Cities and towns in Murtal District {{Styria-geo-stub